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Last weekend, ESL hosted Europe’s most-watched Dota 2 tournament of all time: ESL One Frankfurt 2015 hit a peak concurrent viewership of over one million, more than doubling its record from the previous year. This is the second event for the world’s largest esports company in 2015, which sees more than a million viewers tuning in simultaneously on Twitch in the western world and MarsTV in China.

Held in the Commerzbank-Arena for the second year running, the event attracted more than 15,000 Dota 2 fans on each day of the event, with foot traffic hitting over 30,000 across the weekend. Alongside world class Dota 2 matches, live attendees were able to enjoy numerous festival-like side activities: ranging from archery, bull riding and gladiator duels to airbrush tattoos and personalized Dota 2-themed balloon making.

“ESL One Frankfurt 2015 was a great combination of esports tournament and gaming festival,” said Ulrich Schulze, Managing Director Pro Gaming at ESL. “It was very important to us that we make ESL One Frankfurt 2015 more than just an esports competition. We’re looking to continually build on this with future ESL One events.”

The tournament hosted some of the best teams in the world, and came to a close after four days of world class Dota 2 action, with Team Secret beating out three-time ESL One finalists, Evil Geniuses, for the lion’s share of the US$298,135 prize pool, to which the community were able to contribute. Fans from all over the world witnessed game-defying moments that will surely go down in history: catch highlights, recaps and full-length videos of all the action over on the ESL YouTube channel.

A second champion was crowned on center stage as the Cosplay competition rewarded the Timbersaw costumer-maker from the Czech Republic, who invested over three hundred hours in his final product. Almost US$5,000 in prizes were awarded to a contestant pool consisting of over 43 cosplayers from 10 different countries. Pictures of the cosplay, side activities and esports competition can be found in the ESL Flickr Gallery.